Slide For Life

Conflicting with my overly masculine image, I am not a fan of conflict.  This makes watching Presidential debates very awkward for me.  So much in fact that instead, I usually just follow the intelligent and extremely objective opines of celebrities on Twitter.  During the third debate, while watching a Twitter war between a Kardsashian, a Lohan and another D- list celebrity about the merits of horses and bayonets, I saw a tweet encouraging me to watch the live birth of a giraffe at the Greenville Zoo.  There is absolutely no way this will not be the most adorable video ever.

Hindsight, man.

I pulled up the live feed and it showed the mommy giraffe in her pen with this thing hanging out of her thing.  Whatever was dangling there out of her hoo-ha looked like a cross between the water tentacle in The Abyss and the T-1000 from Terminator 2, but it certainly did not look like a baby giraffe.  Now, I am the first to admit that any word describing or related to reproduction and delivery makes me feel icky but I think this dangling enigma was some sort of sack.  Nasty.  Eventually, this sack like object burst and splattered to the ground while leaving two long, spindly legs flailing wildly out of the mother’s derriere.  If there were a flash and a puff of smoke, you would think David Copperfield had just performed a Las Vegas magic show before your very eyes. 

So the baby legs just dangled there for ten minutes or so in what I can only imagine is an awkward situation for the mother.  I love nature and am all for the natural order of things but at the same time, in my mind, I am screaming for someone to come in there and pull that thing out of her just to make me feel better.  Afterall, this is about me, not a laboring giraffe.   Also, while this dangling monstrosity is there in repose, the mother is defecating doo-doo missiles all over the place.  I respect the heck out of anyone or anything that can multi-task like that.  Can you imagine the concentration it must take to give birth while at the same time taking care of your business?  To my feminist friends, do not worry, I am not pretending I can imagine what child birth can possibly feel like.  I am just complimenting the mother here on a job well done.  Mom, you are truly a master.

I do not generally spend much time thinking about giraffe’s giving birth so I just assumed the mother would lie down as the baby began the slide for life.  I also never really thought about the fact that a giraffe’s nether regions are a good six feet off the ground.  The mom stayed up right and that kid came shooting straight out and straight down. The impact was violent enough that I audibly gasped and even covered my mouth with my fist.  The baby just lay there motionless and I was so freaked out that I YouTubed giraffe births just to make sure I did not witness a death.  Of course, in doing so, I had to watch this violence again three different times and had the same reaction, fist to mouth.  Can I also just point out that when the baby came out, a tsunami of fluid came out with it and flooded the floor?  That is funky.  

For another 10 minutes, the baby just lay there motionless and the mother looked confused.  Or the mother looked as confused as I feel a giraffe is able to look.  Eventually the baby started to move and I felt less girly and more confident in the fact that I was witnessing the miracle of life and not the sorrows of death.  I believe the baby giraffe may be in for a rough life though because after a solid 20 minutes, it still could not master the simple art of standing up.  The poor mom even ran out of patience and walked off.  I also feel for my wife, for being married to a man who would actually watch a baby giraffe attempt to stand up for 20 minutes.

I still found it much more entertaining than a celebrity political Twitter war though.